


COLD-BLOODED AND DRIFTING AWAY.

by electriclandlady



Category: The Bletchley Circle, The Hour (TV)
Genre: Crossover, F/F, Songfic, The Bletchley Circle - Freeform, The Hour - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2019-07-16 15:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16088498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/electriclandlady/pseuds/electriclandlady
Summary: She rereads it, the trunk in her heart she’d shut the ghost of Millie into opening little by little.





	COLD-BLOODED AND DRIFTING AWAY.

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this fic when i was a Yung Babie Lez of about fifteen and although it is cheesy i have grown as a writer and im mostly uploading it here to ~look back on~ to see how ive progressed and shit. if other ppl like it that wld b great too, but yea.
> 
> to stay true to the original post on my old blog this is copied and pasted from, here is fifteen-year-old morgaine's author's note as well:
> 
> 'i took this post [ http://andforgotten.tumblr.com/post/76654516576/aucrossover-in-which-lix-and-millie-meet-abroad ] & ran with it. this sucks because it falls apart towards the end lmao but i poured every bit of my entire being into it. bolded parts & title are from this song [ 'tether' by chvrches. ]'

**-** _**where’d you go, you were there by my side ;** _

 

The rustic burn of Talisker in her throat was nothing compared to Lix Storm’s very presence, Millie mused.

 

Though Millie was a force to be reckoned with herself, unsaid words were often stolen from her mouth, thanks to the other woman’s mastery of the aphorism.

 

It was inevitable, honestly, that they faded together this way. They were different, in looks: Lix’s frosty cerulean hues, craggy cheekbones, nose and jawline; carved in stone, an intimidating face. Millie’s dark auburn hair, enticing smirk and glossy espresso eyes were a perfect offset.

 

There were personality digressions as well.

 

Millie was playful, flirtatious, logical.

 

Lix was observant, guarded, broken.

 

But there were commonalities, too;

 

Their kindness, (although Lix’s was harder to access,) and their independence, a refusal to be tethered by anything or anyone.

 

Except, although neither admitted it, each other.

 

Always tethered to each other.

_**\- keep believing it’s my turn to hide ;** _

 

Of course, it all goes to shit - the late-night Famous Grouse phone calls,

 

Millie’s postcards to Lix from Bali, Melbourne, Rome, Prague;

 

the Galuoises kisses.

 

All because they decide to nip a shady loanshark ring in the bud, but a few dangerous sparks crop up in a small dispute that are fanned into the flames of a full-scale argument, lasting through half the night and Millie’s feelings are scorched, red-hot-liquor-hurt and Lix’s are too, though harder to burn from years of wear and tear.

 

Ashes of pain left unspoken flutter and pile between them.

 

The two fade away.

 

And the tether loosens.

_**\- there’s a tether that’s keeping me there ;** _

 

Lix opens her desk drawer for a pen, and a piece of sun-lightened colorful paper shows its face from beneath a nest of paperclips. Against her better judgement, she unearths it and wipes dust from the surface.

 

It’s exactly what she fears it is. A postcard dated 1948, sent from Monaco.

 

Millie’s half-cursive/half-print dances across the cardstock, spinning tales of upscale casinos, pretty architecture and good weather.

 

Lix can hear her throaty voice echoing in the hollows of her mind as she rereads it, the trunk in her heart she’d shut the ghost of Millie into opening little by little.

 

_Goddamn it, I thought I moved past this._

 

Wiping icy tears from her cheeks with frustrated swipes of her graceful hands, she can only hope Millie feels that familiar pull too.

 

**_\- trade our places, take no chances ;_ **

 

And she does.

 

Wandering around the flat one day with Glen Miller playing quietly in the distance, Millie reaches up for one of her old codebreaking guidebooks as an aid to intercept a sheaf of garbled enigma letters she’d gotten earlier in the day.

 

Without realizing it, she sweeps a pair of hornrim glasses off the shelf as she retrieves the book.

 

When she puts the book down on the coffee table and goes to pick them up, Millie’s puzzled for a moment. The specs look awfully familiar; but she just can’t put her finger on whose they are and where she got them.

 

Millie puts them on the shelf by the lamp and an empty canister of film, and it’s the celluloid that jogs her memory.

 

One Glenfidditch night, Lix’d hurried home, with an apology to Millie - she’d work in the morning, something important. 

As she strode away, the glasses fell from her hair and onto the dirty ground, and Millie had picked them up and called after her that she’d left them, but Lix didn’t seem to hear her.

 

At the memory, Lix’s cinders free themselves from the chamber of Millie’s mind and blend together in a painful cocktail of longing.

 

Millie always felt she was lying.

 

**_\- bind me till my lips are silent ;_ **

Two Taliskers on the rocks, they swore to themselves they’d never do this again.

 

Yet here they are, downing autumn-leaf-liquor and each other, smoking, dancing, talking.

 

Relishing the other’s presence.

 

It’d been far too long.

 

**_\- stay where you are_ **

**_ever after ;_ **

**_chasing things that we should run from._ **


End file.
